Early days...
I grew up in a home where music was the order of the day. My mother played the piano, my house was always radiating in music. There was a large collection of gramophone records, which I was allowed to play. When I was six years old, I was sent to start learning how to play piano with late Lady Abayomi after which I joined the Cathedral Choir. I then moved on to a school in Port Harcourt where I joined the school band. So, it was right from the beginning, I think, that it was obvious to me that this was where I was going. I didn't know how I wanted to or which particular type of music I wanted to play but I knew this was the direction I was going.
Where and when were you born?
I was born at No. 38 Igbosere Road , Lagos on April 8, 1926.
How did you get into music?
Hmm... right from the beginning. My home was musical. My mother sang.
Where was she from?
Equatorial Guinea . Our family is drawn from all over the world. We have got relatives in Spain , in Togo and Sierra-Leone. She came initially from Equatorial Guinea which then was known as Fernando Po . The three of us, my two sisters and I were given music lessons. I went on to join the Cathedral Choir. And then, when I went to school in Port Harcourt , I joined the school band. So, it was a continuous process right from the beginning. From day one, music was there.
What was it like, growing up?
Well, like most children who grew up in Lagos at that time, I was cool and I messed around with schoolmates. I had to go for Piano lessons, choir practice and got into all sorts of troubles that children get into. Like you go playing masquerade, fall down, bruise your knees and when you get home, you are beaten up immediately again for doing that particular thing. So there 'was nothing really spectacular about it. It was like most kids growing up in Lagos at that time.
What were the funny or ridiculous things you found yourself doing while growing up?
Well, I enjoyed anything that was musical right from time. I was a member of my school band in Port Harcourt , Enitona High School , a brass band. In those days, schools used to have brass bands for matching and empire games and things like that. And in most cases, they didn't even allow us to go out and play for engagements. So many people in the society wanted the band that I was in. In the band, we thought it was so strict because we had night engagements. The band was made up of mainly the bigger boys about two or three of us were the only little ones. Those of us who were the little ones always wanted to measure up with the bigger boys. So we got slapped down every now and then. That was funny.
How many wives and children do you have?
(Laughs) I have just one wife. As a matter of fact I don't even have a wife right now because unfortunately, my wife died a couple of years ago. All the same, I have four children, ranging from 13-45.
Can you recall how you met her?
As a matter of fact, it is my last wife that just died. I met my first wife as a student when I was in Oxford . She lived in London for training and was born in the West Indies . She lived in the same hostels with one of my sisters and that was how I got to meet her. She went back to the West Indies and that marriage broke up.
On oxford and Cambridge universities...
The university gave me a chance to get a more rounded education. The music education which I got came as a second stage and the point is that I had already had a developmental stage as an undergraduate which helped me to appreciate the more, my evolution to the second stage.
Did you have any issue from your first wife?
Yes, one daughter.
What is her name?
Maxine. She lives in London .
What about your late wife, any issues?
No issue. Actually, my late wife was my third wife. My second wife was a German and she is back to Germany right now; I had two daughters from her. My last daughter was not from any of my Wives.
You seem to have a lot of women in your life, were you a flirt or something?
Well, let's put it this way, the first time I got married, I was a young student. I didn't really understand what marriage was all about and therefore I was immature. I wasn't ready for it, we broke up. The second time I got married, I was working in Germany away from home. I was there for some time. You know I was not a Priest, so I had a friend while I was there. There is another thing to note here, I am not a womaniser. If I have a woman or a friend, that is it for that time. I'll keep just that one alone.
So what I am trying to say is that while I was in Germany , I needed somebody, a companion and it was easiest to be respected in a foreign country if you were not seen to be playing around with their women. So I got this lady who had two kids fur me. By the time I wanted to come to Nigeria , She wouldn't come with me to Nigeria . She went away and my children were left with me.
And your third wife?
My third wife was a South African. I met her here in Nigeria, Precisely at Ibadan. We didn't have any child together, although she had children before I met her. We had a good family relationship but it is unfortunate that she died recently.
Would you like to take another wife, probably a Nigerian?
To take another wife, particularly a Nigerian, at this age is rather foolhardy because I can't think of a Nigerian woman who would be interested in marrying a 76 years old man. What is she going to get from such a man? But if you talk of a companion, yes I would need a companion but then I don't think there is anybody that can marry a 76 years old man.
Do you have any sons?
Well, I never learned how to make male children. All my children are females.
What brand of music do you specialize in?
That is interesting! It is difficult to class-type what I do because basically, what I do is to interpret the sounds of different areas. The way I started out was that I began with the Nigerian folk materials and then broadened it out to include African materials and then broadened it out further to include music of the black man. But if I write them, I write things that speak to my mind. For example, one of the things which I did few years ago was called "The Road to Freedom", which was a work that interpreted how people in different parts of the world see 'Freedom' .
There are people who have grown up with freedom like the British. To them, it is a matter of course. Then there are people who have never had it with them and by the time I wrote this, Apartheid was a big thing in South Africa and we looked at that situation. Then there are people who are just acquiring freedom, like the newly independent nations. What do they see as this freedom? Some people wonder that now I'm free, I can do whatever I like. Now I am free, I don't have to pay taxes any more like I used to pay. The meaning of freedom was what I was exploring in this particular work.
Other things like preserving our environment, taking care of the trees and plants are the sorts of things that I wrote about. But I will interpret any type of music mainly trying to put the element of that kind of music into a framework that can be understood and appreciated by anybody. Basically, that is what I have been trying to do.
Did your parents want you to do anything else apart from going into music production?
Oh yes! My father wanted me to be a lawyer because he was a lawyer. My mother wasn't much worried about where I went as long as I did it right. But my father wanted me to become a lawyer.
How did your dad react to your abandoning your studies for Germany?
My dad died while I was in Germany . By the time I left Oxford , I'd severed all ties with home. It was the only way I could focus on what I wanted to do. If I had kept ties with home, I would have been under pressure. I got to know about my daddy's' death two years after his demise. And I still didn't come home after I heard the news until five years later.
My coming home was occasioned by the pressure my mother mounted through a friend who knew how to reach me in Europe and secondly due to the fact that I was offered a job back home to work with NBC.
Home coming was not spectacular. I was approached by Tom Charmerson who was the then director of the NBC. He'd offered me a position in broadcasting and I moved out of university and accepted the job. But it turned out that the job offer was not what I'd expected. I accepted the job more as a sacrifice, because before I returned to Nigeria , I worked on three jobs. And what I was paid as income tax was more than what I was paid as salary to come home. I was earning 520 pounds. |
